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Some some Model 3 production equipment is already on line

In its shareholders letter released today for the second quarter 2016, Tesla confirmed that “some Model 3 production equipment is already on line, including initial capacity in stamping and paint centers”. The company also plans the start construction for a “new Model 3 body and general assembly centers” by the end of the year.

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The new manufacturing capacity of the paint shop has been long in the making. Tesla started building the new shop last year and was already aiming for a capacity of 500,000 vehicles per year, which will leave the asset somewhat underutilized until 2018.

The new shop features two separate and fully automated painting lines: one is for full car bodies, and the other for components such as bumpers and rear-view mirrors.

But this has been known for some time now. I believe it is about a year since they installed the new paint shop, and they did say this was sized for about 500k cars/year, and therefor was sized for all the cars they would produce at the Fremont factory - including Model 3. And the same for the new stamping equipment that was installed.

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